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Research Highlights

DOE partners with leading researchers from industry, academia, and national laboratories to accelerate advances in solid-state lighting (SSL). These researchers have made dramatic progress in just a few years, achieving several world records as well as national recognition.

Since DOE began funding SSL research projects in 2000, a total of 71 patents have been applied for or awarded.  For more information, see the SSL Patents fact sheet (PDF 151 KB) in the Publications section of this website. Download Adobe Reader.

Collaborative, cost-shared DOE R&D projects combine the technical resources of premier research institutions and national laboratories with the product development, manufacturing, and commercialization expertise of industry leaders. DOE invests in research projects that target the needed improvements in price, performance, and manufacturability to speed SSL technologies to market.

For a complete listing of current DOE SSL R&D projects, see the Project Portfolio.

Photo of an LED: a bright semi-globe atop a square substrate.

New Benchmarks for LED Efficacy and Brightness

Cree has successfully created a cool white LED prototype that delivers 107 lm/W at 350mA. This achievement builds on the Cree EZBright® LED chip platform, developed in part with prior funding support from DOE. (September 2008) Learn more.

Photo of a dark blue square on a circuit board, with four tiny light blue lights lit within the square. Wires connect on both the right and left.

Achieving Record Efficiency Blue OLEDs by Controlling the Charge Balance

University of Florida researchers have demonstrated a blue phosphorescent organic light-emitting diode (OLED) with a peak power efficiency of 50 lm/W and an external quantum efficiency exceeding 20 percent at a luminance of 1,000 cd/m2, using no external light extraction techniques. This accomplishment is believed to be the world record in blue OLED efficiency. (September 2008) Learn more.

Image of two people standing in a modernistic room with walls and floor composed of a grid of transparent glass rectangles, and glowing rectangles hanging from the ceiling.

Record White OLED Performance Exceeds 100 lm/W

Universal Display Corporation has successfully demonstrated a record-breaking white OLED with a power efficacy of 102 lm/W at 1000 cd/m2 using its proprietary, high-efficiency phosphorescent OLED technology. (June 2008) Learn more.

Photo of a microscope image of a mini deep green LED. Image shows part of a circle with intersecting green bands, green and black shapes, and a smaller glowing circle at the center.

Increasing Efficiency of Green LEDs

DOE-funded research at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) has shown the importance of both the epitaxial structure and the substrate material in improving green light efficiency. The RPI team is working on non-polar epitaxial multi-quantum well LEDs on Gallium Nitride substrates that produce deep green light directly. (January 2008) Learn more.

Photo of a bright purple square with a purple frame containing a bright white light in the center.

High-Efficiency Nitride-Based Photonic Crystal Light Sources

The University of California Santa Barbara is maximizing the efficiency of white LEDs by enhancing the external quantum efficiency using photonic crystals to extract light that would normally be confined in a conventional structure. (January 2008). Learn more.

Photo of what looks like a transparent three-dimensional pyramid containing compartments with the top sliced off, the top remaining part being a white rectangle. There appears to be a person's finger above it.

Record Efficacy for White OLED

Universal Display Corporation has successfully demonstrated an all phosphorescent white organic light emitting diode (WOLED™) with a record power efficacy of 45 lm/W at 1,000 cd/m2. This high-efficacy device was enabled by lowering the device operating voltage, increasing the outcoupling efficiency, and incorporating highly efficient phosphorescent emitters. (June 2007) Learn more.

Photo of an LED light: a white dome with a round silver collar on a flat square substrate, which is on a circuit board

LED Record Efficacy and Brightness

The Cree XLamp® power LED sets new records for LED brightness and efficacy, up to 85 lm/W at 350 mA.The XLamp utilizes Cree's performance breakthrough EZBright™ LED chip; both products include technology that was developed in part with R&D funding support from DOE. (October 2006) Learn more.

Photo of a light blue horizontal rectangle containing darker blue grid lines

Record EQE in Blue OLED Device

Scientists at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory have created a blue OLED device with an external quantum efficiency (EQE) of 11% at 800 cd/m2. This achievement was accomplished at a much lower operating voltage (6.2V) than previous demonstrations, revealing potential for much higher power efficiencies. (November 2006) Learn more.

Photo of a bright white dome sitting on a square substrate, which in turn sits on a larger, thinner substrate

Breakthrough Performance in White LEDs

Cree, Inc.'s Santa Barbara Technology Center has achieved breakthrough efficacy greater than 65 lumens per watt in a white LED pre-production prototype. The improvement in brightness is particularly significant because it was achieved with Cree's standard XLamp® power LED package, rather than a developmental package. (December 2005) Learn more.

Photo of a horizontal rectangular device containing two white vertical panes side by side within a silver frame, with a cord coming out the back, sitting on a shiny surface, with a flower on its left.

New Efficiency Record for White OLED Device

Osram Opto-Semiconductors, Inc. has successfully demonstrated a white OLED with a record efficiency of 25 lumens per watt, the highest known efficiency achieved to date for a polymer-based white OLED. In another breakthrough, Osram has developed the first polymer-OLED, "tunable" light source. (November 2005) Learn more.

Picture of a lot of pink dots with light blue background in somewhat of a star formation, with darker blue and black spots around the edges.

Large-area Photonic Crystal LED Fabricated

Lumileds Lighting, the University of New Mexico, and Sandia National Laboratories have demonstrated uniform light emission from the largest-area photonic crystal LED ever fabricated. A large-area device that can be extended to a more engineered, full-wafer patterning tool is essential for low-cost, high-volume manufacturing. (October 2005) Learn more.

Photo of a bright white globe sitting on top of a column composed of many horizontal metal blades.

Advances in LED Chip Technology, Packaging

Significant advances in chip technology have enabled Cree, Inc.'s Santa Barbara Technology Center to demonstrate white LEDs with record efficacies as high as 74 lumens per watt - on par with fluorescent lighting systems and more than four times as efficient as incandescent sources. (November 2005) Learn more.

Photo of a woman's head in a dark room looking at a square object containing two horizontal rows of bright white circles of light, with a row of what appears to be white text in the middle.

Low Voltage White Phosphorescent OLED Achievements

Universal Display Corporation teamed with Princeton University and the University of Southern California to develop low voltage, high efficiency white phosphorescent OLEDs (PHOLED™). The team succeeded in developing a white PHOLED that achieved a record 20 lumens per watt, operating at 6.3 V. (October 2004) Learn more.

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Cantilever Epitaxy R&D 100 Award

Sandia National Laboratories received an R&D 100 Award from R&D Magazine for development of a new process for growing gallium nitride on an etched sapphire substrate. The process, called cantilever epitaxy, promises to make brighter and more efficient green, blue, and white LEDs. (October 2004) Learn more.

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LED Pioneers Honored

In November 2003, two of DOE's research partners – Dr. George Craford of Lumileds Lighting and Russell Dupuis of Georgia Institute of Technology – were awarded the 2002 National Medal of Technology. These pioneers were honored for their contributions to the development and commercialization of LED technology.

Photo of an LED resembling a gear with six teeth, with what looks like a glass rectangle in each of the teeth, and a brilliant white ball in the center.

White LED Breakthroughs in Performance, Quality

Lumileds Lighting teamed with Sandia National Laboratories to investigate critical materials issues, including the use of semiconductor nanoparticles ("quantum dots") as luminescent down-converting materials for white LEDs. The nanoparticles produced conversion yields up to 76 percent, a world record. (April 2004) Learn more.

Photo of a rectangular white light panel containing grid lines being held by a person on the left (you only see one of the person's hands), shining the light onto a table to the right containing multi-colored balls.

Size and Performance Breakthroughs in OLED Panels

General Electric Global Research teamed with Cambridge Display Technologies to develop a practical-sized OLED light panel that produces 1200 lumens of quality white light with an efficacy of 15 lumens/watt – on par with today's incandescent bulb technology. This achievement broke two world records. (April 2004) Learn more.